The Boboli Gardens in Florence

By now everyone knows the Ponte Vecchio, the Duomo, the Uffizi, but we can assure you that the Boboli Gardens are on the same level as these famous monuments. In fact, they are surprisingly capable of combining the wish to be in the open air, almost in the countryside, while you can admire sculptures and buildings you would not have even suspected existed.

The Boboli Gardens are the great green lung in the center of Florence as well as the only remaining evidence that here in the past was all open countryside.
Each of its monuments, each of its palaces, were direct witnesses to great historical events. If those walls could speak they would tell you much about the Medici, the Habsburg-Lorraine up to the Savoia (the royal family of Italy). Finally today they are open for all of us.

It is so large that you can access it from 4 different points: from the Pitti Palace, from Forte di Belvedere, from Via Romana, and from the Piazzale di Porta Romana.
In fact, we could really write a book about this immense garden, but we prefer to tell you briefly what we saw with our own eyes and give you a simple key to reading it, avoiding yawns and too many dates, that may give you a hand in understanding what we are talking about.

Combine Ancient Egypt, Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome and you will have the perfect mix that will explain you the whole garden. Well, yes: the beautiful novelty that the Renaissance brought was the rediscovery of classical values and,after centuries of the Middle Ages, man is again at the center as ancient cultures had done before. This is why the whole garden is literally full of statues referring to Greek mythology (such as the famous Neptune Fountain) and then there are lots of Muses (gods of the arts), Jupiter, Demeter and many other ancient deities. There are also endless symbols so if you find animals in carvings or statues they will certainly have a deep meaning. For example, the tortoise and the Capricorn: the first symbolizes prudence and slowness, but is balanced by the disruptive strength of the Capricorn that end up being the two constants of the good leader.

A special note concerns the red granite obelisk from Egypt that stands right in front of the marvelous Pitti Palace. The palace itself was commissioned by the Medici family who moved their residence here from the Palazzo Vecchio. It is the only ancient obelisk in Tuscany, it comes from the city of Aswan, and was apparently made during the reign of Ramses II. Amazing to think that it is such an ancient object isn’t it?

One thing you absolutely cannot miss are Michelangelo’s Prisons.

These are copies, as the originals are preserved at the Accademia Museum together with the very famous statue of “David”, but despite the fact that these aren’t original they are breathtaking if you see them inside the “Grotta del Buontalenti” which truly seems a cave.

Come visit Boboli and book your apartment now!

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